From Kosovo to Kabul and Beyond - New Edition

"I believe that the increasing tendency of states to intervene in others’ affairs, and the idea that it is right and legitimate for them to do so is a very dangerous trend. Yes I think so. I would certainly say radical and progressive. Often the case is made by the defenders of humanitarian intervention that theirs is the progressive case, by alleviating the plight of the oppressed and downtrodden. It’s a claim that can be made in good faith but I don’t think it’s right. I think David Chandler is one of the most insightful and consistent critics, and he has managed to make a blow-by-blow criticism of humanitarian intervention. There is a trend among some to cynically dismiss humanitarian intervention, to reduce it to imperialism, but I think what that misses, importantly, is the politics of it. The strength of Chandler’s work is that he never reduces it to old-style imperialism. He is able to meet the challenge of intervention by advancing a very specific set of criticisms. The cynical or old leftist attack on human rights – that it’s actually a war for resources, or for some ulterior strategic motive. But Chandler shows that it is not that kind of agenda that makes human rights problematic, but human rights themselves. I don’t mean the case against human rights as an idea, or the idea that we have no rights. What I understand to be the problem, and I take this from David Chandler, is that the use of human rights in foreign policy is always predicated on there being victims and oppressors. Defending the human rights of others can be a way of masquerading in the language of altruism to advance a particular agenda, or to question the legitimacy of other governments. It can give a ready means to attack other states and to promote the moral authority of your own government. It also undermines the people who are meant to benefit from human rights because it casts them as powerless, downtrodden victims who are incapable of changing their situation and are completely dependent on the benevolence of outsiders."